Prediction of target travel during missile time of flight: A computer simulation

An experiment was conducted to measure an antitank guided missile (ATGM) gunner's ability to predict future target position. In two computer test programs, a moving tank and background were simulated on a CRT display. In the first program, subjects attempted to fire so that the ATGM would impact the target just as it reached a specified position on the display. Target distance, target speed, and time available to estimate target speed were varied. In the second program, the subject had to decide if a gap between two covered areas was wide enough for a missile to be fired successfully. Functional relationships between gunner: ability to predict target position, and target distance, speed, and time available were determined for the first part of the experiment. Functional relationships between gunners: ability to make correct decisions, and target distance, speed and gap size were determined for the second part of the experiment. It was concluded that the gunner's ability to predict target future travel and decide whether or not to fire is limited, but increases with practice. Although both experiments measured subject's ability to predict future target travel, results from the first computer simulation cannot be used to predict performance in the other computer simulation. This indicates that subjects used different strategies to predict future target travel when a very short time was available as opposed to when much longer time was available.